In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

Month: July 2005

That’s Just Great

Wonderful. Just great.

I agree to watching six children this afternoon — ages 13, 12, 11, 10, 5, and 9 months — and I don’t even get the option of screaming at them to get outside already, and shut that door! You lettin’ the flies in! You raised in a barn?!

I may actually have to entertain six kids all by my lonesome?

Someone bring mama some aspirin and tea. She’s having a spell.

UPDATE: I would just like to say that, other than the sweetest baby in the world, I am tired of watching other people’s children. Nannies, my hat off to you.

Tattoos for Jesus

I know a few people who have quite literally gotten tattoos for Jesus, but this?

The tattoo is as old as Cain. In Jesus’ time, condemned criminals were tattooed. Tattoos have marked those set apart or condemned as recently as World War II when our Jewish brethren perished.

In the last few centuries tattoos have become more of an art form dedicated to some person or ideal.

“Mom” was the most famous tattoo in history. It seems obvious that if Jesus were to shock the status quo in the 21st Century with a tattoo that it would say “Father”.

We should be quick to love and slow to judge, Anxious to forgive and repulsed by self-pity, Curious to understand and cautious to resent. There is no box in which we can place Jesus merely by his appearance. As we do good to others, let us not reserve our kindness only for those who look “safe” or “beautiful”. However alarmed we might be at another person’s appearance that is our problem. Tragically we too often make it the other person’s problem as well.

This, however, is even cooler.

I can think of a few people who would kill for this poster. Namely me.

via Chaos Theory

Rosey Grier’s Needlepoint for Men

Emily sent me this link forever ago, and it’s such a cute slideshow that I can’t believe I haven’t posted it yet.

For those of you who don’t know, Rosey Grier was a professional football player for the Giants and the Rams. Bonus points for having Pam Grier as a cousin. He was apparently well-known at the time for his hobbies of needlepoint and macrame, obviously notable for their lack of the expected athletic machismo. I have nothing else to say about this except that Rosey Grier is my hero for the day.

Queer it up, Mary.

The Reduction of Iraqi Women’s Rights

Earlier this month, Jill wrote on the reduction of women’s rights in Iraq and generated a massive comment thread between those who believe that the only women we have to worry about are those who come from conservative families. Because all women will be controlled by their families. As someone who regularly blames the patriarchy*, this isn’t a particularly settling option.

NPR’s Morning Edition featured the largest Iraqi feminist group that is actively, dangerously working against the implementation of Shari’ah. This political position is enough to warrant death, but the spokeswoman for the group rightly contends that the threat of death is better than living as a “slave.” Do listen for more details on how the implementation of Shari’ah will affect women’s right from a more credible source than I.

In the meantime, Patricia at Whirled View notes how Americans are weakening women’s rights with the War on Terra:

[T]wo years after the people of Iraq were “liberated” from the dictator, women in Southern Iraq are being hounded by Shiite vice squads modeled after the religious sadists in post-revolution Iran and in Afghanistan under the Taliban. Even medically-indicated x-rays of females have become controversial!

More to be dreaded in the long run are efforts to deny women full equality under the constitution that is being written for a “free” and “democratic” Iraq. The crux for women is defining the role Islam is to be assigned in shaping legislation. Also critical is determining the extent to which women’s personal status will be governed by conservative interpretations of Muslim family law. We’re talking about marriage, divorce, child custody, inheritance here. We’re talking old fashioned, undiluted patriarchy masquerading as piety.

Patricia, an international affairs specialist, further explains why the bases of the new Constitution are particularly sticky. She details a precendence that was set during her initial entry into Foreign Service:

Read More…Read More…

Israel Will Outlaw Anorexic Models

Jacqui sent me a link to this article, of particular interest for her as she works (or worked?) with plus-size models in the industry.

The Guardian reports that Israel is in the process of ending the employment of fashion models with eating disorders:

This Sunday, a committee of the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, will decide whether to proceed with a bill to compel model agencies to monitor the health and body mass index (the ratio of height to weight) of models. Models would have to undergo regular medical tests to ensure their body mass index (BMI) is 19 or above. The most serious anorexics can have a BMI as low as seven.

If the Knesset passes the bill, [Israeli photographer] Barkan hopes the effect will be two-fold. First, agencies will be forced to confront a problem they have for long ignored and, second, only “healthy” models will be seen on television, in magazines and on billboards.

Barkan would only employ models with a certain BMI, saying that he employed only healthy models despite being able to hide the signs of eating disorders with good lighting and digital imaging software. Barkan also believes that the fashion industry has a huge part in furthering spectacles that lead to body image disorders, saying, “”I think 50% of the problem can be dealt with by us. If the fashion stores, food companies and other consumers of model services refuse to employ unhealthy women, that will remove one part of the motivation to reduce weight.”

This is one overseas reform I can get behind. First Benneton, then Dove, now Barkan. But unlike the Dove campaign, Barken seeks to remove the spectacle from the spectacle, a reform that will begin to reframe normalcy.

Feminists Vie for Female Submission

Last week, a study was released on female sexual submission that concludes “women, but not men, automatically associate sex with submission and that connection reduces the quality of their sexual experience.”

Long stretch, in my opinion, especially since their method of study involved free association with words like “sex” and “oven” (fucking oven?) and came to the conclusion that these terms and the speed with which women responded to these terms draw a correlation with women’s passive sexual activity. It is far more workable to draw correlations between passivity and the culture in which women are made than relying on Freudian psychology to determine the nature of female sexuality. ‘Cause you know Freud was real kind to women.

The priming results indicate that women may have unconsciously picked up the message that they should be sexually submissive, raising the possibility that women have internalized societal pressure, said Sanchez, a recent doctoral graduate in the psychology department and women’s studies.

Previous research suggests that social norms promote deference to men, and this extends to intimate relationships. This message is constantly repeated by the media in magazines, television and movies that “commonly display male sexual dominance over women and female sexual submission to men,” the paper states.

I’d also like to point out that many men and women enjoy various states of dominance and submission at different times in their lives and for a huge number of reasons. Although we can’t claim citations of personal preference are always pure, we also know that the range of human sexuality differs from person to person, politic to politic.

Long story short, we have yet another piece of research that amounts to common sense for any sane, thinking human being. Nonetheless, Cassandra of Villainous Sensibility announces that this study, and other recent studies on sex, is fueled by a dirty “feminist agenda.” I agree with much of her analysis on this research but still fail to see why the pointlessness of it should be laid at feminist feet. Why, we’re the crew that ensures you have access to birth control, sex toys, and sexual healthcare! Some of us even like teh cock!

No feminist I know of cheers at results like this — if anything, it means we ugly feminists have yet more work to do.

via Ilyka Damen

Our Lady of Guadalupe

A well-known fact among my friends, I am obsessed with religious art. The gaudier the better. I am especially intrigued by gothic religious art that depicts gruesome acts, peculiar because I can’t stand gore. One of my favorite subsets of this subject is the wide variety of Our Lady of Guadalupe imagery that can be often found in what seems like odd and inappropriate places.

When Amanda posted pictures of her new religious bathroom art, I had to share my favorite gaudy find.

Guadalupe Mirror

This is my Guadalupe mirror, the light of my interior decorating life. Literally. A flip of a switch on the back of this thing makes it light up like a sign on the Vegas strip, flashing bright red dots at lightning speed. When I found this in a Chicago dollar store I had a hard time choosing between this and the matching Last Supper mirror. The cash flow only allowed for one or the other, and Guadalupe won.

For another example of bizarre artwork I have in the house, see my bedroom art featuring three big-eyed emo kids, two of which look like they’re on heroin.

I’m confident we could have a tacky interior decorating contest among bloggers. We’re so damned geeky you know that 90% of us collect bizarre stuff. If you have anything to share, post pictures and leave a link.